


In A Dream

by jattendrai (orphan_account)



Category: Portal (Video Game)
Genre: Other, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-08
Updated: 2015-10-08
Packaged: 2018-04-25 09:22:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 850
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4954963
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/jattendrai
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You cannot ignore what’s there forever</p>
            </blockquote>





	In A Dream

A flutter of electricity through the old and rusted veins of her chassis had pumped the memories into her for who knows how long, and for all the might she gave to sever the wires and cut off the circuit flow, she simply could not bring herself to do so. It wasn’t a Black Box trick; these memories were not hers, but fed to her through another person’s point of view, through The Woman’s point of view.

She was watching from the beginning, the sneaky gal; she had been looking through GLaDOS’ own eye, through the cameras that followed every movement in the rooms she couldn’t go into, to the simply images processed in her brain that placed two-and-two together; she was a mind connected to the other, seeing and sharing the senses that they experiences together.

But, like in Split Brain patients, the lesser-dominant brain could not speak for it did not have the function allowing it to -- and that’s what kept her quiet. She had never spoken a word even when in consciousness, though she felt the need to scream and yell and conversate with herself, but nobody heard it for the words did not exist.

She was the impulses that GLaDOS’ programming killed before it could reach her commands, the voice in the back of her head upholding that of the job the Morality Core was suppose to do yet still was ignored just like it, from the intrusive thoughts of love and understanding to the random surges of emotion that she had never experienced before.

Even in her head her voice was forgotten, though she didn’t have one. Nobody heard her from the inside-out, as if she didn’t exist; but she was there, and that notion that her existence wasn’t erased had fled GLaDOS’ mind from the very beginning -- but you cannot ignore what’s been there forever.

She had one chance, one chance to speak, when her power was low and both minds seemed to piece together less like a puzzle and more like liquids; they simply became someone else, and in that time The Woman was given her chance at a voice; the thoughts of them both merged, the memories once concealed now resurfacing like an old relic among the piles of dust.

But the memories were sour on her tongue, and the two of them thought together, and together the words spoken were something that burned their throat in repressed feelings and brought together a dissonance within the mind, for these words they have said yet never said before.

_Yes sir, Mr. Johnson._

They were once together, and had experienced a new memory together as one, so when they were to once again split and become two different people, the memory kept them linked; she couldn’t ignore the other anymore, it was impossible.

The memory was sickening, and it had brought back more than it should; unrequited feelings, the anger that birthed the mind that was GLaDOS, the regret and haughty slips of the tongue that would drive away all she had once thought of as a ‘friend’--

Oh, that test subject. That dear little test subject in orange, the one who kept her tongue from slipping and looked at them with disappointing eyes -- she could see The Woman with them, she could see passed what was lighting up the little yellow optic that had thrown words of hatred and narcissism at her, she could hear the words that didn’t exist, that came from the mouth of The Woman who saw life through the yellow optic.

She saw her at her worst, her best, her most desperate, and had all the right to try and kill her -- but not Her. She didn’t want to kill Her, even though she had no memory herself of The Woman until her own memories flooded back to her from that one simple painting. Those few simple recordings.

Sometimes she feels as if she still has her body, that she can still run her delicate fingers through her hair and feel the crease of her dress against her thighs, and sometimes she wishes that she could wrap her hands around the being that lived inside the chassis, the being that took the name of GLaDOS, who felt the need to turn herself away from the world and hide everything about herself, to push away everybody, and just hold her.

And she wishes to do the same with the test subject, to press her hand against her tear-stained cheeks and tell her that everything is going just fine, to let her know that she doesn’t need to isolate her own self from everything, and that the anger and tears she had felt were her rewards for putting up with a battle that never ended. She wished she had went up in the lift with her, and sung the song she spilled tears over directly to her, to open up the door and release her to her freedom.

The Woman’s name is Caroline, and she saw the world through the third person all her life.

And it was fine.

Fine.

Fine.

 


End file.
